A Culture Capsule....
Trip Start
Jan 12, 2006
1
17
28
Trip End
Feb 13, 2006
Nha Trang, Vietnam
Friday, February 3, 2006
After more than 2 weeks here, a real cultural picture of Vietnam is starting to come into focus. Right or wrong, here are my impressions:
Transportation- motobikesr, Honda preferred. Every Vietnamese aspires to at least one. Cars, considering how few there are on the streets, seem to be beyond the reach of most families. Used for everything: shopping, hauling lumber,produce, large panes of glass, and entire families of 5... Carefully and lovingly washed by hand at the neighborhood bikewash. Driving down the center line is preferred, creating your own lane when both lanes are full is ok. Motorbikes and scooter often out pace cars but rarely trucks or buses. Coolest sighting: two monks in vestments wearing pointy wool caps on a motorbike looking like great flapping brown and white birds.
Womens Fashion- There is a Jennifer Lopez thing going on here. Hair, almost always a pony tail with scrunchy. Paperboy hat ( 20's) shaded mirror sunglasses, tight jeans or corduroy pants. Rarely skirts. Almost all the girls/women with office jobs wear the traditional long overblouse with Chinese collar and white poly wide leg pants. Short hooded bomber with faux fur optional but preferred, even on really warm days. The shoe of choice, for everything....a 3 inch heeled sling back. Really amazing to see women on motorbikes dressed to the nines, scooting to a stop in heels.
Mens Fashion- long sleeve button down shirts. buttoned up to the neck (even when really hot,) slacks with sandals or Florsheimesque shoes. Lots of baseball and floppy sailor caps. Facial hair is unusual so... my flavor-savor and Denis' recent 1/2 goatee get a lot of looks and "I like"s.
Architecture- Mostly concrete and vertical, a second floor veranda with balcony is mandatory and third floor roof top garden Favorite house color is a yellow gold. Lots of periwinkle blue with accent color of choice. Still trying to wrap my head around some of the color combinations but Im getting the impression that choice has less to do with it than availability. Everything work saving is painted and lacquered every year. Lots of new Chinese investments have pushed towards very large, very ugly multi story hotels of strange shapes with glaring neon. Interestingly, all the Photoshop pictures of the future buildings are peopled with Caucasians in evening wear...hmmmm.
Food- Anything served over noodles can be made into soup. The food has been amazing but after a while you get the impression that outside of your choice of meat, its a lot like Mexican food. Menus seem extensive but the choice is really just 'what meat?' and over what kind of noodle- fat, thin, fried or steamed and do you want that with broth or not. Perhaps over simplified but essentially correct. Planning on taking a cooking course here in Hoi An so look out for new variety at the next dinner party.
Economy- Vietnam is quickly embracing capitalism. We met a gentleman today who lived through the war, who aptly named the new rich of Vietnam the Red Capitalists in the image of China and Russia. The divide between the haves and the haventgotapottopissin is huge and growing. Without the vast unreported income generated by the booming tourism I dont know what most of the urban inhabitants would do to earn their living. While the hotel industry is fairly well regulated, the immense world of ancillary services: handicrafts, cycle and motorbike rentals, the hordes of street food stalls, tour guiding, ummm....paid companionship etc is pretty much available to anyone with anything to sell. The problem is that competition is fierce and all services are repeated innumerable times everywhere you go. For most things, one need not move a muscle. Someone WILL swing by with something for sale soon. Possibly the most coveted skill here in Vietnam is the ability to speak enough English to close the deal.
Language- ( a little more...) Almost everyone under 50 speaks a little English. Many still speak French but they are a dying breed. Almost every conversation that gets past hello goes like this:
Vietnamese person ( VP)- Hello
Me/and/or/Denis (hD)-Xin Chao (sin jao)
VP -Whats your name?
HD -My name is Denis/Hugo ( We know how to say this in Vietnamese)
VP -Where you from?
HD- My ( America)
VP- You buy me something?
You come look my shop?
Moto?
Hotel?
You like some nice Vietnamese massage? Boom Boom?
Etc.
Etc.
As we almost enter our 4th week here, our Vietnamese vocabulary has not grown much mostly from lack of need. We have memorized the entire page of useful phrases and worked very hard on the almost impossible 6 toned pronunciation. We still always go for the giggle by always saying hello and good-bye in the local tongue but EVERYONE wants to practice their English as it is almost a certain means to a better life. We get a lot of invitations for coffee this way.
The other conversation always comes from unmarried and terrified young women. See above dialogue but after " where are you from?" the question is "Are you married. We have learned to say 'yes.' Then, " Do you have any friends?" Its pretty funny but it can get tiresome.
Shopping- You often get the advice from expats to buy early in your trip. After several weeks here you start seeing the same things everywhere. While there are some beautiful things, shipping is very ,very expensive, heavily taxed and probably not worth it unless you just could'nt leave the country without having it. That said I hope you all like chopsticks!
Hoi An is a bonanza for custom made clothing, wood and bamboo knick knacks and of course plastic and fakes of every kind. 50%poly/cotton is shamelessly sold as 100% cotton. Convincing plastic chopsticks are sold as waterbuffalo horn at prices just higher than bamboo. Thousands of "antique" brass gongs reveal their chemical patina when brought outside into the sun. That said, one store that specialized in ceramic antiques with hefty price tags from single digit centuries was candid about the rack of beautiful but newly made antique-looking objets.
